CNN anchor Chris Cuomo crashed his beloved 1969 Pontiac Firebird convertible in Southampton recently when, sources said, he was drag racing the hot rod. But a friend of the anchor insisted Cuomo never actually raced the car and was just goofing around for photos before he clumsily cracked his radiator by hitting a parked German import.

Cuomo’s wife, Cristina, hosted a chic party for her Beach magazine at Jue Lan Club over Memorial Day weekend, and sources told Page Six the night ended with Chris “drag racing.”

“It was a full-blown drag race . . . Everybody heard it,” said a source. “He lost control and crashed into a parked Mercedes. He was lucky because it was his friend’s car.”

But another source at the party described a more tame scene, saying that when Cuomo exited the bash, “a friend of Chris’ was outside in a 1967 Pontiac LeMans. Chris is a car guy, so he got his car and pulled up alongside . . . A woman stood between them, pretending it was starting line, and people were taking a bunch of pictures.”

However, the second source said the cars “never moved,” but “a photo op became a fender-bender” when clumsy Cuomo “turns his car around to leave and he bumps into another one of his friend’s cars. It was a Mercedes SUV.”

The source said that “Chris broke his radiator, and it was leaking fluid, so he drove home in case the engine stopped working. He told his wife to stay. He knew whose car it was — it had a dent.”

A police report was filed “for insurance purposes,” the source said.

But others said Cuomo’s known as a closet street demon. He posted a video last summer in the same car peeling out on a Hamptons street, and teasing his CNN colleague Don Lemon. “For you, Don,” he says before burning rubber. He captioned the clip, “Not all show no go . . . Just a taste. Sounds good. Goes better :)”